Thursday, September 27, 2012

I saw this at the Clurman Theater in New York in 2007. I can think of few plays I liked less than this one. It was cynical without being interesting. Opaque and yet preachy at the same time. I'll leave it at that. I can't think why we chose it. Maybe the tickets were free?

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Blogger, editor, and actress extraordinaire PopCultureNerd has presented her annual literary self-examination, My Life According to Books.
Each year, PCN creates sentence starters that must be completed by a
book title she has read in the current year (though the book may have
been published at any time). It's just too much fun to pass up (ask Jen Forbus), so using PCN's starting sentences here is My Life According to Books, 2012.

Every Monday I look/feel like: Resistance (Barry Lopez)

Last time I went to a doctor/therapist was because: Memory, Donald Westlake

Last meal I ate was: Suspect (Michael Robothan)

My savings account is:Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn

When a creepy guy/girl asks for my number, Started Early, Took My Dog, Kate Atkinson

Ignorant politicians make me: Blue Nights, Joan Didion

Some people need to spend more time: Making Babies (Anne Enright)

My memoir could be titled: The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving (Jonathan Evison)

If I could have, I would have told my teenage self: How to Build a Better Girl, Elissa Schapell)

MARY HARTMAN, MARY HARTMAN was one of the oddest shows to ever capture the nation's imagination--and not for very long. It was a nightly soap opera that ran in 1976-77 about the trials and tribulations of an American housewife named Mary Hartman. It was tongue in cheek, of course, as Louise Lasser (Mary ) ran around with her hair in pigtails, suffering from the antics of her husband, mother, sister and friend. Much was made of her determination to get her kitchen floor clean.

It was aired late at night because it was somewhat controversial in its themes although daytime soaps seemed similar if less direct to me. The second season found Mary in a mental hospital and the show morphed for a time into FOREVER FERNWOOD and FERNDALE TONIGHT, the name of the town where it took place. Some amusing moments over the weeks it played. But too goofy to last long.

He’d never made love to a man under 25—not since he’d passed that age himself. He’d never made love to a parishioner, nor to anyone in a position of subservience. Never to a woman because he knew he was gay, or queer as they called it then, by the age of twelve. Didn’t seem fair trying to pretend otherwise at someone's expense. Probably couldn’t have done it anyway.

God would help him find his way. That’s what he eventually decided. God made him like this for a purpose. Frank Jr.—and then after his ordainment Father Bertram--believed that fervently. How could he not?

He’d only made love with seven men in his life: with a history professor in college, and then with a boy down the hall his senior year, with his roommate in the seminary a few times, and a doctor who’d he’d been sent to with neck problems when he first entered the priesthood, an artist exhibiting his art in a park down the street from his church in Buffalo (only once), a priest in a parish in the Detroit suburbs he’d met at meetings at the archdiocese.

His brother, Howard, was the first. Howard was as fine-featured and slight as Frank Jr. was rough-hewn and large. Was it possible they even shared the same father?

If Frank counted all his sexual encounters with these men over twenty-five years, they’d number less than fifty. He didn’t know how to count the times with his brother. Did what they did in their cold attic room really count as sex? Most of it was touching, caresses, nuzzling. Didn’t all boys do this with other boys? Wasn’t it more about comfort and warmth in their case?

There’d been no other children, or even many people, in their lives back then, living as they did with a mother who rarely left the house except to go to work. Who disliked her boys leaving home.

“They’ll beat you up,” she said. “You’re the only black boys in this town. And sissy ones to boot.” She’d known before they did.

She came to New Hampshire from New Orleans to cook for a rich white man who favored the Creole cooking she'd been taught, and she went straight from his kitchen to their tiny under-heated, under-furnished house—no stops in between every night. Frank. Jr. and Howard did the shopping, negotiated everything else in the outside world. And at nights, they did what they did. At least, in winter, they could pretend they were keeping warm.

There was no Frank Sr. Never had been. It was years before they cottoned to the fact that Frank Sr. was their mother’s invention. They wondered if they even shared a father but couldn’t ask. Every question, even everyday stuff—like could she sign their permission slip to go to the museum in Concord—seemed to bring her pain, anger.

Howard killed himself at twenty-three following a dishonorable discharge from the Navy. Frank Jr. decided to become a priest the next year. His mother had moved in with the rich white man by then, something the man wanted, she said.

“Do you share his bed?” Frank Jr. asked in a shuddering voice, as she helped him pack his bags.

She didn’t look up. “If he wants. I do what he wants.”

His mother was forty-five—the man nearing seventy. He reminded Frank of Colonel Sanders or Mark Twain, some fancy white guy in a loose white suit. Facial hair, red-faced, dour. For Christmas, he’d given the boys school supplies with the admonition to study hard if they wanted a better life. If he gave their mother anything, she didn’t mention it.

He’d never kill himself, Frank Jr. decided, at his brother’s funeral. He’d use the lesson of his brother’s death, his lonely childhood, his mother’s situation, his own perverse desires, to make himself a better priest.

And he was. He taught history and counseled children, taking on a more prominent role after he moved to Detroit and his parish slowly broadened in skin color, tolerance, language. He learned Spanish, computers, the jargon of children. He was careful to never touch a child, never to favor one. To be watchful of his fellow priests in this regard.

Then came the illness. He ruled out his brother, the professor, the seminary roommate, the boy down the hall at college—all too long ago. And like Father Owens—that was the other priest’s name—he didn’t report the disease. The priesthood and AIDS were not a good fit. Homosexuality and celibacy were at odds. He ignored the symptoms as much as possible, hoping the disease would go away with the new treatments, and for a long time, it seemed more a nuisance than a life-threatening situation.

But because he could not confess his ailment nor pursue treatment openly, superior drugs were excluded from his regimen.

And suddenly he was in and out of hospitals for weeks at a stretch. The Church didn’t chastise him—it was too late for that. He didn’t try to track his partner, find his mother back in New Hampshire, do what he should have done. Most of the priests he’d known for years stuck by him. But he died alone.

Bodiless now, souls intact, they could take comfort in each other purely.

Frank Jr.

A.J. Wright

The
last time I saw him it was an early winter morning and raining in B_______,
maybe raining all over the world. The sun had disappeared behind a sky of gray
slate several days earlier, and the water fell in continuous blowing sheets.
Storm drains in the small town were filling up from the endless rain, maybe
filling up all over the world. Water holding leaves, candy wrappers and
discarded furtive love notes drifted down the gutters everywhere in the
neighborhoods and commercial district.

The
night before I had found much the same rain and flotsam and jetsam downtown,
where only a few people were brave enough to be out and about on the streets.
They were doing their best to look like strangers in raincoats, galoshes and
big umbrellas, but I spotted Miranda’s red scarf right away. She was across the
street, heading into the café; just like me, she was running a little late for
our rendezvous.

“I
wasn’t sure I could get away,” she whispered as we sat down in our back corner
booth. Angie was already on her way over with two cups of black coffee. “He was
supposed to go to one of his stupid board meetings, but it got cancelled. He
finally had enough martinis and passed out on the couch.”

At one
time that image of my old friend would have bothered me. That was before his
wife started to bother me, and not in a bad way. Those days had probably come
to a close; now she was beginning to bother me in a bad way indeed. But I was still
committed to the plans we had been making for several weeks now.

I
decided to cut to the chase and pop the question. “Are you going to be able to
get the money?” I tried not to sound too anxious. She was starting to matter to
me less and the money more. I got the full effect of her dark hair and green
eyes as she stared at me for what seemed so long a time.

“Naturally,”
she told me finally. “I’m on top of it.” And any guy whose help you need, I
wanted to add. But then I had to admire my self-restraint. “I’ll make sure he
gets up for his rehab appointment tomorrow morning. He’s missed the last two
and that knee isn’t getting any better by itself.”

“And
then what?” I knew, of course, but I wanted to hear her say it—again. I loved
to watch her lips moving when she talked.

Another
long stare before she spoke. “I’m going to open the safe he thinks I don’t know
about, empty the contents into my biggest purse, get into my car and meet you
at the airport.” She sounded like she was saying that in her sleep, as if she
had been practicing that sentence over and over.

Yes,
that was the plan, simple and easy as long as we could leave the country
quickly. Neither of us said anything for a while; we just sipped our coffees
and considered the possibilities. We could hear the rain hammering against the
café’s glass windows and sounding almost like gunshots in the distance.

“Anything
I need to bring besides the new passports and stuff?” I tried to keep my tone
light.

She put
her right hand under the table and ran her fingers up my left leg. “No, honey,
you’ve got everything else I need on you already.”

Until
the past few weeks that might have been enough for me; I would have executed
the plan just as she designed it. I’m the usual sucker for a beautiful woman
with a great body and an overwhelming personality. But lately cracks in the
wall of that future had appeared. The phone caller didn’t tell me his name, but
before long I figured out who he was representing.

He knew all of Miranda’s movements,
including her “spa” appointments in the city. He told me when and where and to
be there. I hung up. We did this dance for a while and then finally I took his
dare. Late one afternoon I followed her up the Interstate and discovered
everything I needed to know.

This time nothing Miranda could do
would make any difference. We finished our coffee and left the café one at a
time. The rain blowing on the glass still sounded like gunshots.

And
that’s a true account of what happened to me on the night before the last time I
saw Frank, Jr. As far as the last time I did see Frank, Jr.---well, that’s
another story. Right now, I have some cash to spend.

Frank
Jr

by Frank Webb

I have my father’s eyes—that’s what they tell me anyway—as
well as his name.Frank Sr was in a bad
way after the crash.They’d had him on
life support for several weeks by the time I got the news, and everyone
encouraged me to go visit him while there was still time.He never fully regained consciousness.Hell, he was mostly in a semi-conscious state
most of his life as it was, so it was a fairly seamless, largely unnoticeable,
transition.It had been so long since
I’d seen him that I’d forgotten what he looked like.Hell, I’d even forgotten what I looked like!

Back in the day Dad was tone deaf crooner who loved to hear
himself sing around the house, only what came out of his mouth was nothing like
what he was hearing in his head.While
he was belting out Frank Sinatra, the rest of us were getting a barrage of off-key
sour notes that would rankle the sensibilities of even inanimate objects.Plants would wither and die before the
onslaught, and flowers would close in on themselves when treated to a chorus or
verse.The family dog, knowing the score,
would make herself conspicuously absent whenever he started clearing his throat
by doing a few warm up croaks.What he
lacked in musical ability, however, he more than made up with sheer enthusiasm
and dramatic gesticulating, waving his arms wildly about as he took in the
applause from his imaginary audience.This
was mostly in the mornings.

Personally, I think part of the problem was hearing loss from
working on his cars.He never could
afford a sports car, but liked the idea of having one.He hit upon the strategy of modifying the
family Ford’s muffler so it wouldn’t really dampen the engine noise.Our Fairlane sedan would roar out of the
garage like it had a Saturn-V booster stage under the hood, but it would only
do 0-60 in about 10 minutes, on a good day.This was the automotive equivalent of putting playing cards in the
spokes of your bike, and pretending you were riding a motorcycle.He seemed to enjoy it, though, even more so
since the neighbors always glared at us when we cranked up the old jalopy and
eased out of the driveway.Like a lot of
folks, dad lived in his own world, which only now and then, seemingly by
accident, shared any noticeable congruency with those around him.

Needless to say, all this was strangely tangential to my
nascent sensibilities, musical or otherwise.Somewhere in there I caught Chicken Pox.Don’t really remember it, except as a story they sometimes told about
when I was little, and how they packed me in ice like a mackerel to keep my
fever down.I’d been in remarkably good
health ever since.I’d once strained my
credulity, but that was about the worst of it for most of my adult life.I didn’t know it, but the Zoster virus stays
in you, and can come back years later as shingles.When that happened, it invaded my face,
permanently scarring my eyes.I haven’t
been able to see in a long, long time.

I’m just coming out of it now as the anesthesia wears off.Looking around, the room is strangely bright
and with an unfamiliar clarity that I’ve only been able to dream of.I made it back before Frank Sr died, but
didn’t get to see him.They had time to
prep me for surgery before they disconnected him from the machines.The cornea transplant appears to have done
the trick and I can see things for the first time in years.I have my father’s eyes.Or so they tell me.

Sunday, September 23, 2012

And for me it is the death of Natalie Wood in 1981. I never believed the story that she stepped out into a dingy drunk, fell in the water and drowned because it is widely known she was scared to death of drowning and never went near the ship's edge. Now some new information is coming to light.

Todd Mason will serve as host for FFB for the next two weeks. The third week, the 12th will be Agatha Christie week.

Things are a bit rocky here this morning because of the new blogger dashboard. Sorry.

**Summary still to come. Too many problems to get it up.

Ed Gorman is the author of the Dev Conrad and Sam McCain series of novels. You can find him here.

I hope The Handle by Richard Stark was a pleasure for Donald Westlake to write because it sure is a pleasure to read.The
Organization has decided that it's tired of this German guy running his
big casino on an island in the Gulf of Mexico. He's beyond the
jurisdiction of the Feds and it's unlikely Cuba will do much about him.
Thus Parker is hired to take the casino and its other buildings
down--literally. To blow them up.Now
while The Handle is every bit as tough as Dick Cheney's heart, the
hardboiled aspect is played off against the sorriest group of human
beings Parker may ever have had to work with. And the sardonic way
Westlake portrays them had me laughing out loud at several points.Take
your pick. There's the alcoholic hood who talks as if he's auditioning
for a Noel Coward play; the mob gun dealer who had to quit drinking
several months ago and has increased both his cigarette intake (four or
five packs a day) while maintaining both his cancer cough and his
enormous weight; the pedophile who turns out to be a ringer sent to spy
in Parker and his friends; the Feds who are so inept both Parker and
Grofield play games seeing who can lose their tails the fastest. And
then there's the the married Grofield, Parker's professional acting
buddy, who never passes up a chance to impose his charms on willing
women. In this case he endeavors to put the whammy on the very sexy
blonde Parker himself has been shacking up with. Isn't that called
bird-dogging?And
then we have Baron Wolfgang Freidrich Kastelbern von Alstein, the man
who owns the island and the casino and who, over the years, has managed
to make The Third Man's Harry Lime look like a candidate for sainthood.
Westlake spends a few pages on the Baron's history and it becomes one of
the most fascinating parts of the book, especially his days in Europe
during the big war.The
book is filled with the little touches that make the Stark books so
memorable. My favorite description comes when Parker and the sexy blonde
sit down to a dinner that Westlake describes as "viciously expensive."A fine fine novel.

Blackwater, Kerstin Ekman

Long before the Scandinavian surge of crime fiction of today, a few Swedish writers caught our attention and one for us in the 1990s was Kerstin Ekman.

The plot centers on teacher and mother, Annie Raft, and is set in the 70s, and focuses on events surrounding, and following a double murder at the Blackwater lake in Sweden.

The victims of the murder are two tourists, visiting Northern Sweden to explore its forested wilderness. They are discovered by Annie Raft, herself new to the region, as she and her young daughter Mia scrabble through the forest, searching for the commune where her lover awaits and where they are to start anew away from the turmoil of their lives in Southern Sweden.

Things also deteriorate in the commune. Paradise is not what it seems, nor is Annie's lover. It is years later when this story concludes.

Ekman explores the degradation occurring to the environment at the same time she sets up this plot. The darkness of the land mirrors the darkness of the people who inhabit it. She also examines the animosity between Swedes and Laplanders in the region. From reviews on amazon, I see that this book was too dark for many readers, but we both enjoyed it at the time.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

I think I have seen A CHORUS LINE at least three times. And I would probably see it again. The playbill in my hand is from the Schubert Theater in New York in 1989. Sad that both Bennett and Hamlisch are gone now. If you love dance, love theater, love music, this one is for you.

(There might be some bumps here since blogger has a new format)
How I came to Write: "Blood and Sweetgrass: This Rez is Mine" (from Blood & Tacos #3)I spent the bulk of my junior high and high school years devouring the kind of fiction that drove my English and study hall teachers nuts. Everything I could find by Robert E. Howard that had a Frazetta cover on it, for example. I gorged on swords & sorcery, then a friend of mine traded me the first 50 or so books in The Destroyer series by Sapir/Murphy that starred Remo Williams and Chiun, Master of Sinanju, for some records. I never got around to the more military-based books from that "Men's Adventure" genre -- Death Merchant, The Penetrator, The Executioner, etc. -- but I loved those Destroyer books. I loved the mythology they created, the action, the covers . . . everything. To this day I can still recite the "I am created…" line that Remo dropped in every book.Thing is, when I started writing seriously a couple years ago, I never really tried writing anything like that. But there's no doubt that the scores of thousands of words I've read across all those stories of outrageous adventure informed the stuff I actually was cranking out.Then I heard about Johnny Shaw's bold plan to start editing a quarterly publication that was based exactly on what those stories were all about. More than any other announcement I've encountered, Blood & Tacos was the one that I felt I had to, somehow, be a part of. I obsessed a little over it. Read the first two issues and realized that, "Yes!" he and the writers were pulling it off. So I queried Johnny; he'd heard of me and thought my writing could work, and I submitted a story. And now it's out in the wide world, and I couldn't be more thrilled."This Rez is Mine" is my take on a hybrid of the 70s movie classic "Billy Jack" and the 2009 movie classic "Black Dynamite." My hero is a kickass American Indian named Blood who rescues a young woman -- who calls herself Sweetgrass -- then goes on to foil a plot hatched by a corrupt local big shot and his accomplices, an outlaw biker gang called The Gravemakers. It takes place on the Confederated Salish & Kootenai Reservation in Montana, where I lived for several years in the late 90s. Mayhem ensues.I had an absolute blast writing it, and basically knocked it out in one sitting. I got to pack it full of slices from reallife too. For example, The Gravemakers are a pastiche of The Bandidos, who used to roll up and down I-90 all summer longwhen I was a kid. Frenchtown Pond, where the opening scene is set, is a real place. I essentially spent my summers there.It's where I learned to swim. Back in the 70s, before it became a state park, it was much grubbier than it is now . . .and probably better. And yes, the Bandidos used to occupy the very hill the Gravemakers do in my story, smelling bad,smoking weed and making the locals nervous.There is also a scene where Blood buys a six-pack of RC Cola that is part of a series devoted to baseball stars. When I was a kid, that year I collected those cans. My friend Mark and I would dig through the trash dumpsters at Frenchtown Pond looking for them to stretch our horde beyond what we could afford to drink; I displayed my collection on a shelf in my room. See, digging up those little details, as well as getting to write outlandish scenes that wouldn't necessarily work anywhere else, is what made it so fun. I didn't necessarily plan in advance to use all these little nuggets, they just appeared in my head. Blood was originally purchasing Pepsi (kind of a nod at Sherman Alexie's Indian characters) until I remembered the baseballplayer cans. Those aren't details necessarily recognizable to anyone but me, but I think they add to the overall vibe of acharacter, and that is where it pays off. After all, none of this would work if the characters are lame. I enjoyed the time Ispent with mine, and how they evolved in my mind as I wrote. I look forward to another chance to see what they do next,the heroes and the villains both. I'm hoping the story makes readers want to see what's next too.Oh, and the red '64 Ford pickup Blood drives? I drove it in high school. It had a white top, and it wasn't even necessary to push in the clutch when you shifted if you didn't want to, provided you could rev the transmission just right. My friendsand I referred to it as "The Power Truck." Dorks.
Buy Blood & Tacos #3: http://www.amazon.com/Blood-Tacos-3-ebook/dp/B0094PB3TE
http://www.chrislatray.com
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http://www.facebook.com/chrislatray

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

A top-notch political science journal is putting together an issue that will examine super-heroes over a variety of issues. For example: the impact of real-world events on comic book story lines, vigilantism vs conventional notions of law and order, the treatment of class, sex, race in superhero comics. You get the drift. We had no idea these issues were treated seriously in comic books or graphic novels.

Which superhero series addresses issues like this most eloquently or adequately? What superhero would you choose to focus on?

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

As much as I might list my favorite TV as being shows like BREAKING BAD, DEXTER, JUSTIFIED, HOMICIDE, MAD MEN, THE WIRE, GAME OF THRONES, HOMELAND, there is also a spot in my heart for a long list of family dramas that have allowed me to have a lump in my throat instead of a gut-wrenching feeling in my stomach from time to time.

So thanks to THE WALTONS, FAMILY, THIRTY-SOMETHING, ONCE AND AGAIN, THE WONDER YEARS, NORTHERN EXPOSURE, PARENTHOOD, SIX FEET UNDER and countless others. Sometimes you just need to be touched no matter how superficially.

These are never Phil's favorite TV, but political commentary isn't mine.

Margaret was made five years ago by Kenneth Lonergan and never released for various reasons. This despite the success of his fabulous first film, YOU CAN COUNT ON ME. Now it is available on DVD. The lead role is played by TRUE BLOOD'S Anna Paquin.

MARGARET is an interesting, well-acted, and serious examination of the complexity of grief in a seventeen year old. I was knocked out by both Paquin and Jeannie Berlin's performances especially. Matt Damon and Mathew Broderick play flawed but well meaning high school teachers. I have been told there is an extended cut at three hours that fills in some odd gaps in the narrative. I will try to get that version.

When a girl plays an inadvertent role in a fatality, dealing with its complexity is more than she can handle in her fractured family life. Lisa is a nuanced character you will not always like. So too her mother, teachers, friends. No one is portrayed in black or white. Lonergan sets his story among the bustle of city life, not content to tell his story in a void.

It's long and sad, but on the whole, a movie well worth seeing if you can handle grief and ambiguity. And if you can get the three hour version, even better I am told. At the end, Lisa remains an enigma as all good teenage characters should.

Zadie Smith wrote WHITE TEETH when she was like 22. It's not just that it was great, but that it was about old men in large part. How does a college girl have that sort of insight and such a sophisticated writing style? Are there prodigies in writing?

I know Updike did something similar at a young age (POORHOUSE FAIR), but jeez, WHITE TEETH just swallowed me whole because of its insights into ethnic characters in modern London. It was like Dickens on speed.

Sunday, September 16, 2012

When it comes down to it, I like this sort of crime fiction best. Nothing too cozy, nothing too violent.Good characters, interesting atmosphere, great writing.I am looking for a few (in paperback) to take on a trip. What are some of your favorite books that feature a detective of some sort tracking down a killer.

I read this in January of 1987. It won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award that year. It is the story of a man who is summoned to Memphis by his two sisters when his father threatens to remarry in his eighties. The father is a tyrant who has thwarted his children at every turn, squashing any chance for happiness.

The writing is ethereal even if the plot is not a happy one. None of them have had a happy or fulfilling life and this book examines that.

Taylor is more well known for his short stories, writing only three novels. This is certainly his best one.

Thursday, September 13, 2012

Saw this version in Stratford in 2003. We saw it with our kids about 1979.

Here is a review of the 2003 version.

There's no point in beating around the sagebrush. "The Taming of the Shrew" that opened Stratford's 51st season is one of the worst productions of the play in the festival's history. The Wild West setting is not the problem; rather it's how the setting is misused. Add to that sloppy direction and poor acting, and the show becomes one actively to avoid.

How do you like to see a review like that after spending $200 plus a B & B for the evening.

Taming is always difficult to pull off because it is so anti-feminist. I don't know why it is performed so often, in fact. Like the anti-semitism in MERCHANT, perhaps it is better left alone.

Reading a book now, and it is far from the first, that uses text messages, emails, notes, phone calls, etc. to move the plot along.

How do you feel about this? A little goes a long way for me. I realize a novel set in today's world has to draw from it, but it gets tiring reading who it was that sent the message, who received it, the date, etc.

And yes, I know John Dos Passos was an early believer in story lines composed from letters, headlines, graphics, etc. Loved him and loved the graphics but maybe not the rest.

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

I have been reading a short story a day since January 1. With three plus months left to go, what short story would you recommend I read? A few of my favorites have been A GOOD MAN IS HARD TO FIND (O'Connor) THE NIGHT IN QUESTION (Tobias Wolff) GIVING BLOOD (John Updike), UNCLE (Woodrell) WORLD OF GAS (Campbell), GIRLS IN THEIR SUMMER DRESSES (Shaw), CATHEDRAL, Raymond Carver.

(I am not listing ones here from people we know here although I have read some terrific ones online and in anthologies).

Rip Torn, in one of his best roles, plays a country singer that only an audience can like. Written by Don Carpenter and directed by Daryl Dukes, this is a woefully forgotten film that deserves to be remembered. 1972-73 produced so many great films it gets lost in the crowd. A little like TENDER MERCIES and CRAZY HEART. Something tells me that male country singers are a pretty dissolute bunch.

Monday, September 10, 2012

Despite its rather ersatz appearance today, the town of Frankenmuth, about ninety minutes north of Detroit, has an interesting history. For a full story go here but it was settled in the 1840s by a group of Germans who came there in a group, enduring many hardships along the way.

It is a place we visit perhaps once every two years when we get street fatigue and need some place to go for the day. It is a real town that has somehow manged to look like a faux one. The shops cater to tourists in the dull way of all resorts--except it is not really a resort. There is really nothing to draw one here except there is little else within two hours of Detroit.

It's a place to get a chicken dinner in the German style, buy orange cheese that doesn't taste like real cheese at all, to buy fudge, tee shirts, take a carriage ride down the 1/4 mile stretch of town, visit the biggest Christmas ornament store in the world or go to Birch Run, an outlet mall where on checking price on the handy iphone it turned out nearly everything could be bought back home for less money.

Where do you go when you need to get away for the day? Of course you east coast/west coast people always have the shore. Don't rub it in.

Having spent the last four or so years writing almost exclusively about one character, Joe Geraghty, a small-time PI operating in my home city of Hull, the chance to write a novella for Byker Books’ “Best of British” Kindle series came as a nicely timed challenge.

The chance to support Byker Books is a welcome one for me. Quietly going about their business for some years now, their annual Radgepacket series, now up to volume six, is an essential round-up and opportunity for both new and established writers to display their Brit Grit credentials. More personally to me, they were amongst the first to show some faith in my writing, so when I was asked to consider writing a novella for them, I was only ever going to agree.

And a great challenge it proved to be, too. It was the chance to try a new voice. The central character in the novella is Sam, a young man recently released from prison. He wants to provide for his young family, but Hull is a city with few opportunities. And there are even fewer in the area Sam lives. He’s a young man who only really knows the place as he experiences it. He’s not well travelled, even within the city. So he gets himself involved in a drug deal organised by his mate Jonno. It inevitably goes wrong, but the ensuing chaos gives Sam the chance to get to the truth about his brother’s overdose. It proved to be a fast piece to write and a lot of fun, but it also surprised me - I found myself thinking about unexpected issues - how do young people survive when they’re offered nothing? Are people rooted into places and unable to change or adapt?

I’ve always written about Hull and I suspect I’ll continue to do so for a while yet. “Bang Bang You’re Dead” gave me the chance to look at the city through different eyes. It also gave me the chance to look harder at my home city and discover that although the backdrop to it may be grey and concrete, there are good people and beauty everywhere.

Saturday, September 08, 2012

I am reading STATE OF WONDER by Ann Patchett and the research involved blows me away. In BEL CANTO (one of my all-time favorite books), she learned all about opera and the military and a terrorist group in a South American country. Amazing. And STATE OF WONDER is even more praise-worthy because she has learned about how a primitive tribe lives, how scientific research is conducted, and various related matter. It is also incredibly descriptive--I feel like I am on that river, the mosquitoes that occupy much of the book's themes, buzzing around me, the river snakes slithering by, the tribe engaging in arcane activities considering it is contemporary.

But this book, in particular, is not truly entertaining. It is slow, ponderous, about how people operate in the medical research community, what a primitive tribe might be like, how decisions of youth come back to grab us. All sorts of interesting things, but I am not entertained like I was recently with, for instance, GONE GIRL.

Do you read books that do not entertain you? Since the days when you had to, I mean. Reading such books gives me a certain boost--that I have learned something or read really great writing. But I wouldn't do it for a steady diet. But I also cannot read pure adrenalin rush books all the time either. Do you mix it up too?

About Me

Patricia Abbott is the author of more than 125 stories that have appeared online, in print journals and in various anthologies. She is the author of two print novels CONCRETE ANGEL (2015) and SHOT IN DETROIT (2016)(Polis Books). CONCRETE ANGEL was nominated for an Anthony and Macavity Award in 2016. SHOT IN DETROIT was nominated for an Edgar Award and an Anthony Award in 2017. A collection of her stories I BRING SORROW AND OTHER STORIES OF TRANSGRESSION will appear in 2018.